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They are different situations, but I'd argue they're different in the opposite way. For a car by itself outside, letting it burn would be fine. But in an enclosed parking garage, it's rather important to keep the fire from spreading to the rest of the garage.

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Yes, but the problem with Li-Ion fire in a confined environment is that it generates a lot of toxic gas (doable but you need equipment for that), a lot of hydrogen which will react with everything near by, and the risk of explosion (in the sense of rapid fire expansion with a thermal run-away of most cells) is higher.

My guess is that the floor was poorly ventilated with complex access, rendering the access to the fire unnecessarily hazardous.

If your concern us protecting the rest of the garage, putting 28,000 gallons of water in a basement may well flood it anyway.

It may protect the structure but the issue here sounds more like firefighter safety.

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